Prospects for Competition or Coalition

Ray Block Jr.

Fall Semester, 2020

Overview

  1. conflict vs. coalitions: revisiting the Debate
  2. shared status as a common ground
  3. readings on the politics of conflict or coalition

Conflict vs. Coalitions

Conflict vs. Coalitions

Conflict literature & NEGATIVE inter-group attitudes

  • Labor-markets (Bobo & Hutchins 1996; McClain 2006)
  • Social relations (Walton et. al 2020)
  • Prejudices (Gay 2006; Sniderman & Piazza 2002)

Conflict vs. Coalitions

Coalitions literature & POSITIVE inter-group attitudes

  • Coalition partners (Jones 2019; 2020)
  • Elite backing (Benjamin 2017; Sawyer 2005)
  • Linked fate (Masuoka & Junn 2013; Sanchez et al. 2019)

Conflict vs. Coalitions

Conflict studies Coalition studies
Age of literature tends to be older tends to be more recent
Focus of literature tends to be mass-level tends to be elite-level

Perceived shared status might reconcile these literatures

Shared status as common ground

The Role of Shared Status

Assumed hierarchy of “social position”

  • Whites are on top
  • Blacks are at the bottom
  • Other non-Whites are somewhere in between

The Role of Shared Status

Shifting attitudes = f(changes in racial status)

  • if minorities believe they are similarly-situated,
  • they may come to view each other as partners (not adversaries)

The Role of Shared Status

Shared status counteracts nativist/zero-sum thinking

  • many Blacks see the current political climate as weaponizing anti-minority sentiments
  • many Blacks respond to this climate by sympathizing with other minorities

Readings on conflict vs. coalition

Conflict vs. coalition readings

Connecting last week to this week

  • Empowerment: The consequences (and/or causes) of Blacks being politically incorporated
  • Empowerment requires the cultivation of both electoral and governing coalitions
  • Coalition-building can mean partnerships within or between minority groups

Conflict vs. coalition readings

Something to ponder:

  • Why do cross-group coalitions sometimes succeed and other times fail?